28 January, 2011

Friday 28 January 2011- four weeks into the new decade and the eastern quarter of this country may be thinking, "When is this going to end?"

Massive flooding in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria (and I'm not forgetting the people in the Gascoyne Region of WA either) has been an ongoing event since just around Christmas.

Now it would seem it may be our turn in the northern part of Queensland. We have had a couple of major rain events and lucked out on a couple of others as the systems skittered past without a major deluge. Anthony (the cyclone, not Cleopatra's consort) seems to be heading our way (again).

The system headed away from us toward Vanuatu or Noumea last week as a cyclone and dissipated to a tropical low pressure system as it travelled eastward. Today; however, Anthony did an about-face and has started to make for our shores.

Upgraded to a Category1 cyclone and forecast to intensify to a "2" or possibly "3" before landfall, I guess it's time to ensure all of the cyclone preparations are in order:

Just need to fill some large containers with water, move some furniture off the deck and we should be "right as rain" as they say.

The worrying thing about all of this is that there is another system brewing out near Fiji which is predicted to follow hot on the heels of Anthony. A much larger, more intense system which should be on our doorstep next Thursday- category 4 or 5. Current modelling shows it coming to land just to the south of us. Here's hoping the modelling is wrong and it heads for the Galapagos.

04 January, 2011

I hope you saw out 2010 in your favourite way on the weekend. Dee and I had a quiet evening at home with a few glasses of bubbly, a feed of prawns and a favourite from the old country, oatmeal brown bread. I don't think I have had that particular type of bread for probably 15 or 18 years. And nothing beats fresh home-made bread just out of the oven. I know, I know- I shouldn't eat so much bread but sometimes you just have to reward yourself.

I suppose I could have made a New Year's resolution to cut down on this, that or the other- but I've never been one much for New Year resolutions. And I reckon that the amount of cycling we do allows us to eat just about whatever we want (within reason of course- I mean, I don't think I would eat a bucket of fried chicken anytime).

So instead I have my New Year's Revolution- wherein I will make every effort to turn as many revolutions of my pedals as often as circumstances allow. And if the weather cooperates, I'm hoping that will be quite often.

And thanks Terry for the botany/Latin lesson. I took my name BoaB from the "Bloke on a Bike" component of my blog title with the realisation that there are boab trees in Australia. On this morning's ride, Terry gave me the Latin name for the boab- Adansonia gregorii. Named after one of Australia's early explorers, Augustus Gregory. (Link from the Australian Dictionary of Biography)